


How may I direct your gull? (or: Can you hare me now?)

by Syrena_of_the_lake



Category: Watership Down - Richard Adams
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-04
Updated: 2019-10-04
Packaged: 2020-11-23 05:42:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20887067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syrena_of_the_lake/pseuds/Syrena_of_the_lake
Summary: Campion and Hazel or Bigwig exchange correspondence, of a sort, via Kehaar. But the gull doesn’t exactly care about repeating things verbatim — and he has Opinions of his own.





	How may I direct your gull? (or: Can you hare me now?)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SkyEventide](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkyEventide/gifts).

**Present day**

Bigwig perked up around ni-Frith, when a triumphant shriek echoed from the direction of Nuthanger Farm.

“Kehaar’s back!” he cried in delight.

“Was it the bird or the cat making that embleer racket?” grumbled Holly. His shredded ear had long since healed, but he was still inclined to surliness when confronted with sudden, high-pitched noises.

“It was the catbird, Captain,” piped Bluebell, “chasing himself around the yard. Sometimes the bird goes first and catches himself by the tail — and sometimes the cat gets the jump on himself and does the reverse.” 

Bigwig paid little attention to Bluebell, as was his wont. Wind stirred the black thatch of hair atop his head, and his sensitive, questing nose quivered, but otherwise the big buck was still as stone. 

“He’ll come in good time, Thlayli,” said Holly.

“Catbirds usually sing in morning, but this one must have overslept,” agreed Bluebell in his own bemusing fashion.

Another screech and a distant yowl drifted up the down.

“What I wouldn’t give for wings,” sighed Bigwig.

Bluebell shook his head solemnly. “It would never do, you know. I’ve never heard of such a thing as a rabbit-bird.”

Bigwig cuffed him half-heartedly, his attention still on the sky. As usual, he was the first to spot the big black-headed gull winging towards them.

“I’ll start digging for beetles,” offered Bluebell. 

“I’ll get Hazel-rah and gather everyone in the Honeycomb.” Holly, too, had perked up with the gull’s impending arrival — although he wouldn’t go so far as to gather beetles. “Kehaar is bound to have news of Efrafa.”

As far as Bigwig was concerned, any news short of a loose dog on the down paled in comparison to Kehaar’s tales of the Big Water. He alone waited in the open until the gull dipped lower and lower in the sky, his silhouette growing as he neared. Kehaar spiraled in and flapped his wings mightily as he landed. Bigwig never moved, even as the downdraft blew little clods of dirt in his face. 

“Meester Pigvig, you getting fat like seal!” crowed Kehaar.

Bigwig did not know what a seal was, but it hardly mattered. “And you are getting slow, if you let that cat almost catch you!” He bounded around the gull in mock charges until one snowy wing sent him sprawling.

“I am fast like vind,” boasted Kehaar. “That damn cat, heem slow like seal. You fat seal, heem slow seal, you be goot friends, ya?” 

When Hazel arrived, Bigwig and Kehaar were exchanging cheerful curses and hopping around each other in wild, uncoordinated circles. It took Hazel some time to corral the two; they were really hlessil at heart — born wanderers.

Maybe they all were, thought Hazel, or they wouldn’t have embarked on this journey in the first place. The challenge, of course, was how to make a warren — a home — out of a motley crew such as theirs. Hazel rather thought they’d done a fine job of it so far.

Apparently Campion thought so too, if Kehaar’s relayed message wasn’t off course.

“Meester Campeen vants Meester ‘Azel teaching heem how rabbits be rabbits,” announced Kehaar as they made their way up the down. “You got mudders, ya? You got goot rabbits now, no more trubbles, ya? Meester Campeen got mudders, got plenty rabbits, but also got plenty trubbles. Heem rabbits no act like rabbits.” Kehaar made a retching noise of disgust. “Some run like men, some bite like dogs, but all ees rabbits and big damn mess.”

Somehow Hazel doubted Campion had put the problem in exactly those terms.

* * *

**Two days earlier**

“Do you understand _freedom_, Kehaar?”

Campion spoke slowly, and Kehaar rustled his wings with impatience.

“Fly to Pig Vater, two goot vings, fly all I vant, ya? Pig wind, pig sky, pig vater, plenty feesh!”

Campion didn’t know what _feesh_ was, but he supposed the open sky would be the epitome of freedom to a bird. “Yes, only freedom for rabbits is big grass, plenty food, plenty does — er, mothers — and safe warren, I mean home.”

The big gull cocked his head and eyed Campion shrewdly. “You say _free_. Free is no _safe_. Free rabbits ees come, ees go, maybe ees like Meester Pigvig and ees chasing foxes up and down. Heem free, but not plenty safe!”

Thlayli had chased a _fox_? Campion scrubbed his face. He must have misunderstood, but it wasn’t a tangent he cared to pursue. Although his words were muddled, Kehaar’s point was clear.

“We don’t stop rabbits anymore, Kehaar,” he said, rather stiffly. “They can come and go as they please. I made announcements. I told them what they can do, now.”

Kehaar’s bright, black eye pinned him in place. “Ya, but rabbits no know. Rabbits stay in tunnels, dem stay with _marks_, dem sweem like liddle feesh in puddle, no go Pig Vater. You tell dem, ees free, ya? But dem no know free.”

It was a long, impassioned speech for the gull, and Campion only followed half of it (Frith on a stick, what _were_ feesh?), but it was enough to get his fur up.

“I have told them they are free to silflay, to feed when they like. No more marks, no more turns.” But Kehaar was right, Campion realized. Out of ingrained habit or lingering fear, the Efrafan rabbits had largely kept to the rigid restricions of their former lives under Woundwort. Campion knew, now, that none of this was natural. He had struggled mightily to wrest control away from the remaining Owsla, who had kept up some semblance of wide patrols out of sheer stubbornness (encouraged by Campion). 

He had thought that would solve everything. With Woundwort dead and the old Owsla effectively banished, Campion had thought the rest of the rabbits would revert to basic rabbit nature and all would be well.

It had become considerably more complicated than that.

“Rabbits no need telling,” scoffed Kehaar. “Dem need _doing_. You ask Meester ‘Azel, he got plenty farm rabbits, plenty mudders from you. Dem damn fine rabbits now.” 

Campion sat up. “Would you ask him for me, Kehaar?”

Kehaar’s bill clacked and clattered. Campion supposed that meant something in bird language, but he couldn’t fathom what: surprise? irritation? laughter?

“Ask heem vat?”

“Ask him how to teach rabbits to act according to their nature.”

Kehaar twisted his head to look at Campion sideways. “Ask heem _vat_?” he repeated impatiently.

“Ask him how to teach rabbits to be rabbits.”

* * *

**Present day**

“Blasted bird must have misunderstood,” Hazel heard Holly mutter. 

Bigwig’s hackles rose, but it was Fiver who spoke first.

“You’re absolutely right, Kehaar. Campion does have a big problem. How _do_ you teach freedom?” He gazed steadily at Hazel.

Did all Chief Rabbits have to field weighty questions like this? Hazel thought of the Threarah, who had seemed so wise but who, when it came right down to it, hadn’t known what to do to save his own warren.

“I don’t think freedom is something that can be taught,” said Hazel slowly. Rabbits shifted in consternation, but Fiver sat still at attention and everyone else soon quieted. “But it _is_ something that can be learned,” finished Hazel.

Kehaar said nothing, but his eyes gleamed with approval.

“What say you, Clover?” asked Hazel, turning to the former hutch rabbit. “Or you, Hyzenthlay and Thethuninang?” The Efrafan does looked startled but pleased to be asked for their opinion, but it was Clover who answered first.

“Learning isn’t easy, or fast, or comfortable,” she said plainly. “There is still a lot I don’t know — which smells are elil and which are merely strange, when to stamp and when to freeze, what is instinct and what is indecision. I know I must seem like a kit. Everyone has been very patient with me, even when I have been impatient.” She scuffed at the dirt as if digging for words. “I keep thinking that there will be an end. That someday I will know enough, that someday I can relax and just... stop being so aware of everything all the time. But there isn’t, is there?”

Hazel touched his nose to hers. “That’s what being a rabbit is,” he said, the words feeling utterly inadequate. “Until we stop running.”

Why didn’t Fiver say something? Or why didn’t Dandelion sally forth with the perfect story of El-Ahrairah’s exploits?

“Everybody learn,” squawked Kehaar. “Meester Pigvig learn to stop chase foxes, Meester Plackperry learn to sail poat, Meesus Clover learn all dem rabbit tings. Ees goot, ya, but Meester Campeen, he no learn, only teach. He fly before valk. He like new captain on Pig Vater, he try tell everybody how do. Meester ‘Azel, you tell _him_ how do, and he stop, ya?”

“Hazel will sort it,” said Bigwig firmly. 

Hazel glanced at Fiver, but he was whispering with Thethuninang. “I’ll try, Kehaar.”

* * *

**Three days later**

“Meester ‘Azel say you sailing poat all wrong,” declared Kehaar. 

“Does he really?” Campion kept his amusement to himself rather than lose it too in translation.

“Ya. Your pig general, heem like poat with ropes too tight — too much wind, sails too pig, poat sink, SPLOOSH!” He flapped his wings mightily, and Campion dodged the downdraft. He thought he knew what a _poat_ was, and of course he knew ropes, but he wished he could get Kehaar to sit still long enough to explain _sails_. 

“But you—” Kehaar jabbed his bill at Campion, who dodged again with weary patience. “You like new sailor, you leave ropes loose, sails loose, everybody flap-flap-flap in vind. You no fix, everybody sink like furry rabbit-stones.”

“Sploosh?” guessed Campion wryly.

Kehaar clacked his beak. “Ya.”

“I see Hazel-rah has become quite an expert on boats. You’ve taught him well, Kehaar.”

Kehaar settled his wings and preened. “Ya. I go now?”

Campion wondered, as he had hrair times before, how Thlayli summoned the patience to talk with the garrulous gull. “Soon,” he promised. “Was that, er, _all_ that Hazel said?” He was certain it was nothing of the sort. 

Kehaar eyed him shrewdly. “Beetles?”

“My Owsla are digging them up as we speak.” And wasn’t _that_ rich, making the brash young rabbit bucks dig like does, all for beetles for a bird? Already Kehaar’s visits had quelled a few upstarts who thought they could be the next Woundwort. Campion knew better. Efrafa would never have another general.

As soon as Kehaar had crunched his way through the first course of shiny-backed beetles, Hazel’s real message began to take shape.

Oddly, Campion had the sense that it rather mirrored Kehaar’s earlier litany of advice, if only the terminology weren’t so impenetrable. 

“Dem farm rabbits, nobody never tell heem vat do. Deem don’t know how to rabbit. Ees different problem.“ Kehaar gestured widely with his wings, dismissing the hutch rabbits as irrelevant. “Damn pig general always tell _everybody_ vat do, ya? Rabbits don’t know how do if general no ees telling, ya?”

“Ya... er, that’s right,” admitted Campion. “We’ve been living under so many rules for so long, it’s hard to know what to do without them. The warren is still half tharn — frozen in indecision. The other half is worse.” He scuffed the dirt angrily. “They think they have free rein to bully and run whatever risks they please, not a thought in their blasted heads for the rest of the warren!” Campion couldn’t say it aloud, couldn’t even think it, but sometimes he wondered whether anything could hold Efrafa together without Woundwort.

“Haff like little rabbit Pipkin, all scaredy until Meester ‘Azel make heem brave. Other haff like Pigvig, chasing foxes until Meester ‘Azel tell heem stop.”

“That’s all well and good for Hazel,” said Campion crossly. It was hard enough not to constantly measure himself against the General. Was he now to be compared to Hazel — and found wanting? “The Efrafans don’t look to me like that,” Campion admitted. “They’re still waiting for Woundwort to come back from the dead.”

Kehaar made a retching noise. “You no need damn general.” He eyed Campion shrewdly. “And you no need Meester ‘Azel. Eff-ee-fa need purpose. Then rabbits forget all apout scaredy and foxes.”

Campion started at the gull. Was that Hazel’s advice, he wondered? Or Kehaar’s own?

“Purpose,” he repeated thoughtfully. 

Kehaar bobbed his head. “Give heem goot one, ya?”

“I don’t suppose you have any suggestions?” Campion asked. Spying the crafty look in the gull’s eye, he added, “And I don’t mean beetles.”

“Feesh,” countered Kehaar promptly, and threw his head back to screech with laughter. 

* * *

Hazel found Bigwig perched atop the down, as if surveying the land below. But Hazel rather suspected his friend was watching the sky instead.

“How much of our message do you think will really get through?” Hazel asked. He nibbled idly on a wilted cowslip.

Bigwig squinted at the clouds. “About as much as Campion’s got to us. Frith in a hole, you don’t really think Campion was asking us about _liddle feesh_, do you?” He chuckled. “But Kehaar’s better at reading the lay of the land than we are. He sees almost as far as Fiver.”

“What was that last thing you said to him?” Hazel had kept his curiosity at bay, not wanting to be the sort of chief rabbit who had the last word over everything. But he had puzzled over Bigwig’s parting words since Kehaar had taken off for Efrafa. “I couldn’t make head or tails of it,” he admitted good-naturedly. 

“I just told him to give Campion a challenge. He’ll run himself to ground if he thinks too much — a lot like me that way. But set a cat or a fox in his path and he’ll kick it all the way down to Kehaar’s Big Water.”

“A good thought,” approved Hazel, “but what did you _say_?”

“All hands on deck.” Bigwig looked immensely pleased with himself.

Hazel puzzled over this a moment and then shook himself. “I don’t know what Campion will make of that.”

“Not much, I’m sure” said Bigwig. “But Kehaar knows what I mean.”

“It _would_ take a wild bird to understand you,” said Hazel fondly.

Bigwig lifted his nose to the wind. “Ya.”

* * *

Not long after, Campion officially reintroduced the Wide Patrols — with a difference. The whole warren was involved one way or another. Veterans taught young, fractious bucks how to travel safely unseen, how to track and how to defend themselves against wandering elil. Does taught their kits about lands they had never seen, passing on knowledge for the next generation, and few does even joined the patrols themselves.

But there was no more chasing strangers, no more impressing lone hlessil, no more seeking out danger for danger’s sake. Now, the wide patrols followed in El-Ahrairah’s footsteps, learning to outwit elil and men alike. They sought out distant farms and even more distant warrens. They built on Hazel’s example and formed networks of allies among birds and mammals. They were Owsla, tricksters, ambassadors, and more. Campion’s wide patrols soon became the pride and symbol of the entire warren.

The Efrafan age of exploration had begun. 


End file.
